Yu Yu Hakusho: Epidemic
by Yukiminess
Summary: The demons who once wielded the miasma that caused the worst diseases in human history meet and become lifelong friends with Hiei, Kurama, Yusuke, Kuwabara, Yukina, Genkai, Koenma, Botan, Keiko, Shizuru and the others.
1. Chapter 1

When I was 14 I used to write this secretly in my head. It was kind of a jumping-off point for Yukimi herself. When I was sad or angry (which was all the time) I used to turn to this for comfort and humor when my life was lacking in it. So it begins

The young girl, Yukina, bloodied, suddenly comes out of the woods near Genkai's. She's gasping for air and weeping at the same time. Her kimono is torn near her crotch and she keeps looking back into the woods with eyes that hold an expression of unspeakable horror. Genkai must hear the sobbing because she opens one of the sliding doors and walks out. She sees Yukina and immediately runs to her at top speed.

"What's wrong? What happened," the older woman asks, showing concern and shock in her face.

Yukina says nothing but her eyes said it all when she looked up at Genkai. The older woman merely nodded and picked the girl up and brought her into the temple, looking back at the woods suspiciously and angrily.

A phone rings on a small table in an unfamiliar apartment. A tall, masculine-looking woman with straight, mid-length, light brown hair and plain brown eyes walks over to the table where the phone is ringing and picks it up.

"Hello?" she coughs twice before continuing. "What?! No, I needn't go out today. I said 'no'. Dude, seriously, 'no'! Why?! Yukimi is dead, bye-bye," she yells the whole time she's on the phone and when she hangs up she does so abruptly, harshly and noisily.

"Damn it all to hell, Junior, you know I'm going to come the minute I'm not yellow anymore."

The brunette walks over to the window on the far left wall from the table the phone sits on and coughs lightly. A moment later a knock at the door is heard. She walks over to the door, crossing her small but clean living room and making her way to the door. Suddenly, the person knocks at the door. The person on the other side knocks back in an odd manner. The woman smiles and starts drumming on the door, moving with visible weakness. The person on the other side starts drumming back in the same rhythm. Then the woman knocks on the door in an odd manner again, listening to how the person on the outside knocks back.

"Who is it?" asks the tall brunette, hoarsely but with mock innocence.

"For the sake of all that is holy, open the freakin' door," says a voice from the other side of the door.

The woman smiles again and takes a step back before opening the door. When the door opens a medium-height, very pretty strawberry-blonde walks through the door. The taller woman leans on the door as though she has just collapsed on it before closing it quickly. The pretty woman walks over to a couch next to the window and sits down. The taller woman traipses over to stand in front of the couch, right in front of the woman.

"Gimme," she shouts with her feet far apart for balance. The woman on the couch stands up and holds out her hand. There's a pill bottle in her hand. The taller woman grabs it and then falls over, onto the floor and the coffee table.

"I'll go get you some water-," she was interrupted by the other woman rising to a kneeling position, opening the pill bottle and dumping it on the floor. She makes a fist with her right hand and smashes all the pills on the floor. She seemingly carefully measures some of the powder from the crushed pills and then carefully puts the dust on the coffee table next to where she is kneeling. She then puts her nose directly on the fine powder and sniffs loudly.

"Or you could do that," she says, perplexed by the woman's actions.

"This way it goes straight into the bloodstream. I'm kind of on a time-crunch here," the woman says, her nose covered in powder as she looks up at her companion. The woman then does her best to stand and make her way over to the couch, stumbling only three times before finally completing the task.

"You know, I am questioning why you have the couch facing away from the window. Hell, I'm even questioning why you even have it so close to the window," says the pretty woman, taking a seat next to her friend.

"It makes me look more vulnerable than I actually am. Don't worry, though, I plan on giving up as soon as I get whiff of him again. Again, the world will be safe thanks to Yukimi Kitsune," says the tall woman, snuggling to the back of her couch and closing her eyes.

"Sleep, you brave warrior, you. I'll be here when you get back on your feet," says the other woman, grabbing a remote from the coffee table and turning on the big screen TV.

"Ouch," shouts a medium-height, pale woman with light brown hair and long eyelashes in a different apartment.

"What'd you do now," asks another person, whose footsteps grow closer then retreat.

"I cut myself chopping these vegetables. You think I have the DTs? My hands won't stop shaking," asks the woman, looking around for something near the cutting board with her shaking hands.

"If you had the DTs everything would be shaking. Maybe you're just nervous. If you have the DTs, why are you chopping vegetables?" asks the other woman who is heard but not seen.

"I have to eat, Satchiko! Besides, I haven't been off the sauce long enough to have the DTs,"

"Then why did you ask if you had them? Can I come in the kitchen?" Satchiko asks.

"By all means, come in. Why do you always ask?"

"I'm trying to be more polite. I feel like I'm pressing my luck when I'm not polite these days," says Satchiko. Footsteps are heard before a woman of average height and long, straight blonde hair enters the kitchen.

"These days… She hates me, you know," says the brunette, looking down and refraining from chopping.

"She doesn't hate you…she just doesn't know how to act around you. What happened wasn't really your fault. It wasn't anyone's fault, now that I think about it. You know her, though. She always likes to blame someone for everything. She's like a kid that way," Satchiko says, walking up to the brunette before putting a hand on her shoulder.

A few minutes pass in silence without either of them moving much. Satchiko takes her hand away as her friend turns her head to look at her. Suddenly, she starts to laugh and Satchiko takes a step back and looks at her.

"You're a pretty shade of yellow…"

"It's a whole new millennium now…Did you see the king on Tuesday? He needs to know about the new millennium." dazedly asks the woman, grabbing a paper towel from a roll on the counter and tying it around her now bloody finger.

"Look, blood." She says, holding up her bloody finger.

"Reiko… When was the last time you went outside?" Satchiko asks, looking Reiko in the eye and speaking very emphatically.

"Yesterday…Tuesday," says Reiko before moving to lean against Satchiko. She wraps an arm around the blonde's neck and moans loudly and then retching.

Satchiko tries to pull away from her but Reiko just gets dragged across the kitchen floor as she does because she won't let go of Satchiko.

"Teach me to dance!" shouts Reiko at the top of her lungs.

Satchiko pulls free, growling as she does so. Reiko falls flat onto the floor, face first before vomiting.

"Sorry, Reiko. I have to make a call," says Satchiko as she walks out of the kitchen and into the entryway of the apartment. She walks up to a small table with an old-fashioned phone on it and picks up the receiver.

"Please be home! For the love of God, please be home," Satchiko whispers, sounding more than a little panicked as she dials the phone. There is ringing and then someone picks up. "Yukimi! Reiko has been exposed! …Naoko. Reiko has the Black Death. No, I don't know. No, I asked and she's not lucid. Delirium would be my best guess. Yeah, well can she get here? No, I don't have it. She's already jaundiced! Hell, no, I can't leave! Because it's kind of against the point, Naoko! Yeah… Ok. You're right. *whines* I'm so gonna get arrested! Ok, fine. Bye." Satchiko slams the phone down and runs back into the kitchen.

"Reiko, I have to go outside. I'm gonna lock you in here so you can't leave. When I come back I'll have to break down the door, that's how you'll know it's me."

Satchiko walks up to Reiko who is lying on the floor and not saying anything. She reaches down and takes her left wrist in her hand. After a minute of having her fingers on Reiko's wrist Satchiko stands up and walks away from her.

"I'll be back, Reiko. You hang on. Remember how liver failure is a bad look on you? Hypoxia and rigor mortis would look a lot worse."

Satchiko flits out of the kitchen and then out the door. Once on the other side of the door she looks around the stairwell to make sure no one is there and then sticks a hand in the pocket of her jeans. She pulls a bunch of change out of her pocket and starts putting the coins in the space between the door and the door frame. She makes sure they're nice and tight by giving the doorknob a good tug and then covers her mouth before flitting down the stairs so fast she seems to vanish.


	2. Chapter 2

"So I got a call today, from Prince Enma Jr.," says Yukimi before taking a sip of green tea from a brown clay cup.

"The bane of my existence! How is he?" says the strawberry-blonde, putting her cup on the coffee table in front of the couch.

"I didn't ask, Naoko. All he did was tell me that I needed to come right away," Yukimi says, sighing and looking down at the fine powder next to the cup on the table.

"Come where? He called when you weren't lucid, didn't he?"

"Yep, the dude was talking about some little girl who is just like me. What does that even mean? Is she a fox or a demon stuck in human flesh? How else could she be like me?"

"Wait, did he say she was like you or like us?"

"I don't know. If she's like me she could be anything, if she's like us Well, we only have the two things in common," Yukimi's eyes widened as though she realized something when she said this and she stood up from the couch.

"What are you doing?! You can't be in contact with anyone but me and Reiko for three more days," as Naoko said this she put a hand on Yukimi's right shoulder and she fell back onto the couch.

"I hate youso much... Wait, why can I only be around you and Reiko?"

"Because I'm immune and Reiko… Oh, that's right! I'm so sorry I forgot to tell you! Satchiko called and said Reiko has been…exposed… Satchiko was over at her apartment and Reiko was jaundiced, apparently. Don't worry, I sent Satchiko out to steal some tetracycline. Things should be better by now."

Yukimi sighs and calmly stands up again.

"…You sent someone with the Black Death out get the cure, thus infecting dozens of other people? And what do you mean things 'should' be better by now?! Either things are or they aren't," Yukimi shouts with her hands pressing her tear ducts as though she has a headache.

"It's not like we had any other choice! You're still sick and teeming with bacteria and Reiko was a mere day and a half away from dying!"

Yukimi closes her eyes and groans before speaking "The right decision was to let her die. You know that and I know that."

"Yukimi, that's your daughter you're talking about," Naoko shouts, the anger and shock plain on her face.

"…Do you want to live, Naoko? Do you honestly want to be alive?" Yukimi asks, her eyes open now and looking directly into Naoko's.

Naoko looks like she might cry for a moment and then says "No.", before looking down in guilt.

"What makes you think that Reiko wants to be alive? She had and lost the same things you did and she's not nearly as strong as you."

"Good point… but what's done is done. Satchiko exposed humans to the Black Death and Reiko lives to see another day."

Yukimi walks slowly over to the telephone and dials.

"Hello? Reiko? How are you feeling? Ohhh, good. Yeah, I heard. No, Reiko. It's fine. It wasn't your fault, it was mine. You had me worried for a minute. Yeah, we almost lost you. Yeah. Yeah, that's what Naoko was telling me. Yeah! That's what she said! What is it with you people and Shakespeare? Ok. Alright. Yeah…uh-huh. Well, how is Satchiko? Good. That was smart, yeah. Dude, I gotta go. No, I'll be up and at 'em in a few days. Yeah, sure. See you then. Bye." Yukimi hangs up the phone and sighs, leaning over against the table the phone is on.

"Is everything alright?" Naoko asks.

"Yeah, Reiko is fine. Satchiko is fine. Um…I should go to Koenma's in as soon as I'm better. Reiko invited herself over for tea, will you take care of that?"

"You could call her back later and tell her yourself."

"No, dude, I should just sleep and recover, dude. I'm gonna catch some Zs, dude. Let me know if I'm needed," Yukimi says, stumbling over the word dude and sounding as if she's on the verge of tears. When she says 'Let me know if I'm needed' she walks away from the phone and looks Naoko square in the face.

"Yukimi, do you want to be alive?" Naoko asks as Yukimi walks toward the bedroom.

Yukimi turns, beaming from ear to ear and says "Of course! Life is a wonderful thing! Besides, I didn't lose much so I'm not all sad and stuff."

Naoko's eyes narrow and she gives Yukimi a dirty look that says "I'm not buying it."

"Well… I don't have much of a choice," Yukimi says with a slight accent before walking into the bedroom.

Reiko sits up in her bed and sighs.

"I don't know how it happened, Satchiko."

Satchiko rolls her eyes and says "Yeah, right. How many people in this day and age contract the Black Death without knowing how they contracted it?!"

"Quit yelling. I still have a headache, you know." Reiko says hoarsely.

"Well, whose fault is that?! How many times have you gone outside in the past 7 days?" Satchiko shouts, waving her arms and stomping around Reiko's bed.

"None. I have plenty of groceries and no reason at all to go outside."

"What about work?!" Satchiko says, pacing around.

"I got fired, remember?" Reiko says angrily. "Why are you blaming me?! Dammit, not everything is my fault!"

"Don't yell while your throat hurts! Besides, I didn't say everything was your fault. Catching the Black Death is your fault. Well, yours and hers!"

"Just go away, Satchiko. You don't know anything…" Reiko says before covering her head with a blanket and turning away from her friend.

Eventually Reiko falls into an angry sleep. Satchiko opens a pill bottle and dry swallows a tetracycline. Then she walks out of the bedroom and then makes her way out the door, locking it behind her.

At Genkai's templeKuwabara sits and waits patiently outside the sliding doors of a room he doesn't seem to want to go in.

"I don't get it. What's wrong?! Why can't I see her?! Is she in pain? Is she sick? Why doesn't she want to see me?" Kuwabara thinks to himself, hanging his head.

Outside the temple in those same woods Yukina had come out of hours earlier Yusuke sped through, looking for clues. Suddenly, he stopped and looked over his shoulder. Kurama ran up to where Yusuke was waiting and then stopped.

"Hey, what are we looking for anyway?" Yusuke asked as he looked at Kurama.

"We're looking for who hurt Yukina. Weren't you paying attention to Genkai?" Kurama asks curiously.

"Yeah, I know that. But how will we know when we find a clue?"

"She was bloody so look for blood on the ground, the twigs and the branches," Kurama says, looking down to examine the ground.

"I wonder why she won't let anyone in there but Genkai? Kuwabara must be going crazy back there," Yusuke says, grinning at the thought of it.

"You don't get it, do you, Yusuke? Yukina wasraped," the words stick in Kurama's throat as he says the final words.

"Are you serious?!" Yusuke shouts, blushing "That's horrible! Who would do something like that? I thought someone just beat her up in the woods,"

"Yusuke, that's who we're trying to find," Kurama says emphatically.

Yusuke looks at him, his face full of guilt and then turns to look at the vast wood.

"Let's find this prick," he says before running off to search again, Kurama right behind him.

The brunette Keiko is walking on a sidewalk on a city street carrying an umbrella. The rain is light but continuous and the sky is dark grey. She walks past an alleyway between two shops when something catches her eye. The blonde, Satchiko is kneeling down in the alleyway, groaning profusely. Keiko walks up to her.

"Excuse me, are you alright?" Keiko asks, clearly concerned.

"I'm fine. I'm just trying not to throw up." Satchiko says without looking up or moving.

"Oh. Are you sick?"

"Yeah, I guess. I really should be out right now."

"Oh. Well, are you sure you don't need help?" Keiko asks, moving to look the blonde in the face.

"Yeah, I'm fine." Satchiko says, moving her head to hide her face from the girl. Suddenly, Satchiko slumps over. Keiko shakes her twice.

"Hello? Are you ok?" Keiko asks, sounding really worried.

Keiko shakes the woman a few more times and then sighs. For a moment Keiko looks around, helpless. Then she looks at Satchiko and pulls her up and practically carries her out of the alley. Keiko is not extremely strong so she only makes it a few feet before leaning Satchiko up against a wall and resting. Satchiko stirs and opens her eyes. She looks over at Keiko and cringes.

"Did you touch me?" Satchiko asks calmly.

"Yeah, you passed out."

"Um, thanks." Satchiko says, putting a hand behind her head. Then Satchiko's knees give way and she starts to slump down the wall. Keiko grabs her and smiles.

"Look, this rain isn't letting up anytime soon. If you're sick you really shouldn't be out in this storm. I don't live far from here. Would you like to stay with me until you feel better?" Keiko says kindly, watching as Satchiko slumps down and fidgets.

"Yeah," Satchiko says, looking up at her. "I'd like that" Satchiko smiles at her and slowly rises to a standing position. Once she's sure she can stand Satchiko holds out her hand to Keiko.

"I'm Satchiko. Thanks for all your help."

Keiko smiles and shakes her hand. "I'm Keiko." The two of them walk slowly to Keiko's house in the rain, chatting and laughing.


End file.
